In the field of electrical appliances, in particular in the field of lighting systems, said systems and apparatuses are in some instances already installed during construction of a building. In most cases, however, those apparatuses and systems are installed only after construction of a building, when a room has already been finished. Within the building or room where the apparatuses or systems are to be installed, there is typically only limited access to electrical wires for providing electrical power supply to the electrical appliance itself on one hand side and to a control device, e.g. a switch, on the other hand side.
Control devices, e.g. control switches, are typically mounted on walls in a height within reach of a user. Accordingly, there are only limited options for installing control devices like control switches without having to install additional wires. Installing additional wires is however considered to be a major disadvantage, and as such sought to be prevented at all costs, as it either requires installation on wall surfaces which is aesthetically disadvantageous, or in the alternative requires installation into corresponding recesses inside a wall. However, those recesses need to be provided in said wall, which causes undesired additional installation effort.
In practice every 5-7 years buildings are reconstructed, rooms are shifted or cubicals are moved. Also in these cases re-wiring of wired switches is sometimes difficult and expensive. In some countries it is legally required to have a light switch installed. Having non-wired switches increases the degree of freedom to implementing a more efficient floor plan.
To address the problem of easy installation in combination with flexibility of installation, manufacturers of switching systems have suggested a way of wirelessly controlling lighting apparatuses. In one known system, and on/off switch is connected to a 433 MHz transmitter which sends a signal in response to detection of a switch action. The signal-receiving devices in said system are adapted to accordingly be turned on or off, depending on the transmitted signal. These transmission systems are usually installed as an upgrade and coupled to conventionally located and installed light switches on walls. The transmission units of these known systems require active supply of electrical power. To achieve said supply, these transmission units are typically fitted with batteries or use the electrical energy supplied to the switch. A problem generally associated with these known systems is that while improving flexibility over purely wire-bound lighting systems, the known systems still require a preexisting control switch to be mounted thereon which limits their flexibility. A further problem is seen in that these known systems can only provide basic switching functionality, e.g. on/off switching functionality, and are systematically not able to provide more complex control functions like for instance variation of light intensity or color.